FREED

Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) treasurer general and deputy agriculture minister designate Roy Bennett has been released after spending three nights in police custody.
Bennett was released late Friday night following an order by High Court judge Charles Hungwe earlier in the day.
“He has been released. The prison authorities verified the order after we served them before releasing him,” said Trust Maanda, Bennett’s lawyer.
Hungwe reinstated the US$ 5000 bail, and further ordered Bennett to surrender the title deeds of one of his houses and to report thrice a week at Harare’s Law and Order division between 6 am and 6 pm, conditions that Bennett was given in March when he was granted bail.
“I feel great. I didn’t know it would happen like this. It’s unbelievable,” said Bennett soon after his release.
Bennett said he would not take a break from politics but had been made stronger by the incarceration.
“All this persecution was meant to make me and the party (MDC) back down. But it has made us stronger,” he said.
Earlier in the day MDC leader and Zimbabwe Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai told journalists that Bennett was not being “prosecuted but was being persecuted”.
Bennett’s arrest has made fissures in the coalition administration apparent with MDC cutting all communication with Robert Mugabe’s ZANU PF.